The following censorship instructions, issued to the media by government authorities, have been leaked and distributed online.
Chocolate allegedly inspired by the “pigfestation.” (via Weibo; h/t FT)
Central Propaganda Department: The Shanghai Huangpu River dead pig incident is already being dealt with effectively. Related follow-up coverage should follow Xinhua wire copy and information issued by authoritative local departments. The media are not to send journalists to Jiaxing or similar locations to investigate, nor to sensationalize or comment on the issue. (March 19, 2013)
中宣部：上海黄浦江死猪事件已得到有效处置，相关报道按新华社通稿及当地权威部门发布的信息刊播，各媒体不派记者到浙江嘉兴等地采访，不炒作不评论。
As of yesterday at 10:29 p.m., nearly 15,000 pig carcasses have been pulled out of the Huangpu River, reports AFP. The pigs were dumped from Jiaxing, a town upstream from Shanghai in Zhejiang Province. The ongoing scandal continues to inspire dark humor online. Yaxue Cao at Seeing Red in China reflects on the relative calm of Shanghaiers as the corpses are pulled from the source of over 20% of the city’s drinking water.
Chinese journalists and bloggers often refer to these instructions as “Directives from the Ministry of Truth.” CDT has collected the selections we translate here from a variety of sources and has checked them against official Chinese media reports to confirm their implementation.
Since directives are sometimes communicated orally to journalists and editors, who then leak them online, the wording published here may not be exact. The original publication date on CDT Chinese is noted after the directives; the date given may indicate when the directive was leaked, rather than when it was issued. CDT does its utmost to verify dates and wording, but also takes precautions to protect the source.
